Skill Assessments
The amount of data generated from measurements can easily be overwhelming. The core of CueMate’s skill assessment is the hierarchical skill model which organizes the information following how the brain performs and learns movement behavior.
Hierarchical Movement Skill Model
As described in the background section, the movement skills model is organized hierarchically.
This corresponds to high-level characteristics, such as stroke map, then the stroke classes, and the stroke phases, and finally specific stroke features.
Recall also that this organization reflect show the brain organizes, performs, and learns movement behavior. Therefore, this representation is also meaningful for assessment and training since it allows delineation between different dimensions of skill deficiency manifesting at distinct levels.
Skill Assessment Scope
Recall that your skill level and general performance on the court depend on a wide range of different factors and dimensions. For example, your stroke performance alone depends on your preparation, setup, stroke execution.
The current emphasis of the skill assessment is the stroke performance, encompassing aspects from strike quality, consistency, technique, and overall quality in terms of generating key outcomes such as spin and ball spin.
Hierarchical Movement and Skill Assessment
CueMate analytics and scores are organized following the hierarchical skill model shown in the diagram below.
The main take away from the hierarchical model is that a tennis player's overall capabilities are a combination of low-level physical features and movement characteristics that determine movement technique and performance. These combine or integrate to form stroke classes. Then, at the top level, they get integrated into a stroke repertoire. Ultimately, these elements are deployed as part of game strategies.
Skills, therefore, follow from an integration of parts into a whole. Mental models can act from the top down to set pressures to improve specific aspects of movement performance, which are achieved by operating on specific movement features.
Skill Metrics
As illustrated in the diagram, skill metrics can be determined to describe a wide range of attributes across the different levels.
CueMate uses this model and organization to generate a variety of analytics and scores that cover different aspects of your performance and skill learning.
These are organized from the bottom up:
- Stroke Class Metrics focus on specific characteristics of stroke performance, such as their outcomes, technique, and physical performance.
- Stroke Class Scores describe different aspects of the stroke classes' performance(strike quality, outcome level, outcome efficiency).
- The Learning Stages determine how far along the brain's learning process has progressed foreach stroke class. The primary stages are formation, consolidation, and optimization. Knowing the learning stage helps determine which aspect of stroke performance to focus on during training.
- Repertoire Metrics describe the skill attributes considering the entire repertoire of strokes. For example, the learning stage distribution across the repertoire defines the Skill Status. Other important repertoire distributions are the spin and intensity distributions.
- Skill Rating describes the overall skill based on properties of the stroke repertoire and learning stage. The skill rating is specific to the stroke category (Groundstrokes, Volleys, Serves).
- Global Rating Score combines everything to provide a total score that is used in the leader board.
Stroke Class Scores
The stroke class scores are computed by combining the various stroke metrics and are designed to assess how you are doing across these different aspects of performance.
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CueMate uses the following Class Scores:
#1 Strike Quality Score
Captures the quality of the ball strike (impact timing, sweet spot, and precision). Strike quality is necessary for a good outcome but not sufficient.
A good score is achieved by anticipating the incoming shot, preparing and setting up for the stroke, and finally executing the stroke.
#2 Stroke Quality Score
#3 Outcome Efficiency Score
As its name implies, it captures the efficiency of your technique in producing the stroke outcomes. It is a good measure of your technique, i.e., how well you use your body biomechanics to generate spin and speed.
Outcome Level Rating
Captures the level of the stroke’s spin and ball speed outcomes relative to the player population across all groups. CueMate considers three levels from low, medium, and high.
This rating captures the quality of your strokes in achieving the spin and ball speed outcomes and makes it possible to understand where your different classes fall across the repertoire.
Skill Rating
CueMate’s Skill Rating was developed to address the difficulty of rating skills reliably. The Skill Rating considers the learning process, i.e., how you acquire the repertoire of strokes.
Global Score and Leader board
Given the multi-dimensional nature of skills, it is difficult to reliably reduce your skills to a single score.Therefore, the global score and leaderboard ranking are only indicative. In particular, skills rely on the ability to build and win points and other aspects of game strategies.
[Reference to the diagram illustrating the levels or performance]
Activity Profile
The most fundamental aspect of training is to get enough repetitions of a particular stroke under a range of conditions—your brain cannot learn without going out on the court and performing. As biological systems, we cannot be programmed like machines.
The activity profile tracks the user's activity level across the different stroke categories and classes. If a user isn’t doing well in a particular stroke class, it is often because they are not performing and practicing that stroke enough.
Stroke Class Assessment Types
Description
Stroke Class Metrics
Strokes in the same class Focuses on attributes of the strokes in a class, different aspects:
- Outcomes: Spin and Speed
- Technique
- Physical performance
Stroke Class Scores
Combines the metrics to capture more macroscopic aspects of behavior:
- Strike Quality
- Stroke Quality
Stroke Class Ratings
More comprehensive aspects such as:
- Outcome levels
- Learning stage: memory formation
These ratings capture macroscopic associated with the learning process.
Stroke Class Scores
Interpretation
Stroke Class Scores
- Shot anticipation
- Stroke preparation
Stroke Outcome Level
Stroke level of outcomes (spin and speed).
Stroke Outcome Efficiency
Efficiency in achieving the outcomes. Low values indicate deficiencies in stroke technique including use of the body (kinematic chain).
Stroke Composite Score
Combines all the stroke metrics to create a composite score.
Repertoire Metrics
Interpretation
Repertoire Distributions
Distribution of the stroke classes how you specialize your strokes to best respond to different conditions and outcomes.
Forehand/backhand ratio
Are you using enough backhands?
Intensity Level
The physical intensity of your strokes across the repertoire.
Spin Differentiation
How well can you generate spin across different intensity levels.
Player Skill Ratings
Interpretation
Skill Status
Distribution of the learning stage across the repertoire.
Skill Profile
Distribution of the stroke composite score across the repertoire.
Skill Rating
Rating between 1 - 5 for each stroke category (Ground strokes, volleys, and serves) tells you how far along you are in the learning journey.
Player total Score
Combines everything to provide an overall rating that is used for the leaderboard ranking.
Player Activity Profile
Interpretation
Player overall activity in terms of strokes, duration of play, per week, month
Are you showing up on the court enough and regularly to make the desired progress and sustain the desired level of performance.
Activity types including games, training, free play
Are you playing enough games, training, etc. given your aspired player type.
Activity across stroke categories and classes
Are you performing enough of the stroke categories and types to achieve the desired level of progress and performance.
Interpretation
To help with the interpretation of the range of metrics, CueMate also provides features to:
- Class scores metric highlights: which metric leads changes in a particular class score
- Trends: tracks the evolution of a metric or score over time a given time period
- Reference Values: provide distribution of a metric or score value
- Reference Groups: defines the player subgroup used to derive the reference values (skill level, social groups, etc.)
#1 Class Scores Interpretation
Since score are made by combining metrics, they can be used to determine which aspects that have the highest impact on your skills for a specific stroke class.For example, using theStroke Quality Score it is possible to determine which metric is the leading contributor to a trend. This information is useful to determine what aspect to focus on to achieve the highest impact on stroke quality and performance.
#2 Trends
Another aspect of interpretation is by assessing changes over time.
#3 Reference Values
The most central in assessment is using reference ranges. The reference values make it possible to understand how metrics are typically distributed. To make these references most relevant, CueMate defines reference groups that reflect your level and style of play.
#4 Session Scores
Session scores provide information about how well you are doing overall across your sessions or sets.
#5 Global Score and Leaderboard
The Global Score combines the different scores to give you an overall picture of your skill level. Note that CueMate also has skill ratings that are used more specifically for training.The global score determines your rank in the leaderboard.